Floriculture & Landscaping

Floriculture

• Floriculture constitutes a horticultural and botanical discipline rooted largely in commercial ventures. Floriculturalists specialize in producing flowers for nurseries, greenhouses and garden supply stores. These commercial growers use plant breeding techniques and a strong knowledge of botanical genetics to create healthy plants with optimal aesthetic qualities and resistance to pests and diseases. Floriculture leads to the development of many new strains of plants designed with uniquely colored flowers or foliage, increased cold hardiness and pest resistance or alterations in size. Professionals work with potted plants and cut flowers.

Landscaping

• Unlike floriculture, which constitutes a very specific discipline, landscaping entails a wide range of things. In basic terms, landscaping constitutes any design or modification made to a natural environment through use of plants and space. Landscapers design everything from home gardens to public parks and the grounds of golf courses. Urban landscaping entails creative uses of city spaces such as rooftop, deck or terrace gardens or the optimization of plant variety in confined spaces with restrictions such as poor soil or little sun exposure. Landscaping incorporates the use of trees, bushes, grasses, flowers, ponds, rocks, bridges, lanterns and more.

Differences

• Landscaping often involves floriculture, as landscape environments commonly incorporate flowers as part of their overall design. However, floriculture represents a highly specified field in which professionals work only with flowers and their genetic development. Landscaping, on the other hand, considers a broad range of things, including plant species, the size and shape of space, climate and conditions and the needs of a client. Furthermore, while floriculture represents a predominantly commercial endeavor, landscapers work on a variety of projects benefiting the public, including parks, sports fields and the grounds of schools, museums and other public buildings. As a discipline, landscaping and landscape architecture often overlaps with urban and municipal planning.

University Resources

• Universities throughout the United States maintain academic programs in floriculture and landscaping art and architecture. Schools also provide resources for professional floriculturalists such as tips for breeding and pamphlets on optimal growing conditions for a variety of flower species and types.

  Schools with academic programs in floriculture include Ohio State University, North Carolina State University, and Colorado State University. Landscaping programs exist at schools such as Purdue University, the University of Minnesota, Colorado State University and the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. Many of these programs offer courses in floriculture. Purdue, Colorado State and UMass, for instance, offer a floriculture concentration or program within the larger framework of the landscape architecture program.